breath, one wrong look, and it will all be over.
His lips find the crook of my neck and I exhale a contented sigh as my body threatens to melt beneath the comforting weight of him. His lips trace delicate patterns against my skin at first, but the longer it lasts the greedier and more desperate we become. Kissing each other. Touching each other. Holding each other.
But then he says, “Are you sure about this?” and we unravel. My skin burns while my lungs stretch and fill, breathing far easier than they do when he and I are apart. If I could curl into this bed with his skin against mine for an eternity, I would.
I run my tongue over dry lips, trying to find the right words, though I’m not sure what I want. My willpower around Bastian is abysmal.
“I get it.” He spares me from having to answer by being the first to speak. Gently his fingers glide through strands of hair that have fallen free from their coiffed style. He twirls a finger around one of my curls. “I may not have been cursed to a person, but I was cursed to Keel Haul, remember? As much as I love that ship, my curse made me resent it. I don’t want that for us.
“I know what you’re feeling is terrifying,” he continues, shifting so that he’s more to my side than on top of me. “But we need to work together if we’re going to get through this, Amora.” The way my name sounds from his lips stokes a ravenous fire deep within me. “Whether you like it or not, I’m in this mess with you. You don’t have to put the weight of the world on your own shoulders. Let me carry some of it, too.”
“That’s easier said than done.” I pull away from him, but he takes hold of my shoulder, pleading for my gaze. I don’t give it to him; if I do, I fear it might shatter me completely.
“Maybe it’s easier for you,” he says. “But stars, I need help, too. Only unlike you, I’m not afraid to admit it. After everything that’s happened, sometimes it feels like the world’s going to crash down on me at any moment. But being with you steadies me. I know you’ve wanted space, and I tried my hardest to give that to you. But I can’t do it, because being apart doesn’t only hurt you. I’ve tried so hard to be there for you, and to give you time, but … I need someone to be there for me.”
I can’t imagine the strength it must take to admit those words. But still, I can’t look at him. I clench my hands into the fabric of my pants.
“You don’t have to love me.” His voice is gentler this time, so soft it’s little more than a whisper. “You don’t have to do anything. But we need each other right now, and we went through too much for our relationship to waver because of a curse that we’re going to fix, together.”
The plea in his voice is enough to knock the wind out of me. No longer is the weight of his body a comfort; it’s suffocating. I push myself free from Bastian and clutch my tightening chest.
The sides of the room sweep inward, until all I can see is a tunnel ahead. My breaths come fast and hard, and my body is too heavy and too cold for me to be able to focus enough to do anything about it.
I can no longer see Bastian at the end of that tunnel, though somewhere in the back of my mind I know he must still be sitting in front of me. Instead I see Father, dead on the ground. I see Kaven smiling over him, a blade dripping with Father’s blood raised to his lips. When I do see Bastian, it’s him convulsing on the ground, eyes rolled backward into his skull as a crowd of the dead swarm around him, watching with hunger in their smiles.
Then, all I see is the blood, weaving itself over my vision.
Red.
Red.
Red.
Red.
There are sounds now, coming from the tunnel. I can’t decipher them at first, but they grow louder and louder until they’re beating against my skull like the painful hammering of a struggling Kerost.
I try to drown them out, humming a familiar sea shanty under my breath, trying to steady the rhythm. I try to focus on it amid the pounding of